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Damn rudder lines! HELP!

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5 years 3 months ago - 5 years 3 months ago #34813 by nickselleck
Last weekend I bought my first surf ski. Yay! I bought second hand fiberglass Force Field ski from Sydney as my first boat to get the hang of this sport.

Being cheap and 2nd hand it needed attention to a couple of areas. One of those being the rudder lines which were stainless steel and badly crimped causing friction in the steering. I tracked down some replacement rope similar to Dyneema I'm hoping will be an improvement over the S/S cable. 

So researched a number of topics on this forum and others to make sure I followed "best practice" in swapping the cables over. I successfully changed the LH rudder cable by supergluing the two lines together and then putting some heatshrink over the join. This worked well and I was able to slide the new rope through the guide tube. When it came to the RH side though I had problems due to the guide tube causing friction and as I carefully pulled the S/S cable through it separated from the new rope. Dang it!

- I tried pushing the S/S cable back out so I could have another go but it wouldn't push back through the dodgy guide tube.
- I tried pulling on the guide tube so I could trim a little off the end of the tube to clean up the bad section. I fear this might have dislodged the guide tube at the rear end of the boat but I'm not sure if this guide is one piece?
- I tried using the removed LH cable to "push" the RH cable out the back through the guide hole but that failed. I got it most of the way out and then it seemed to stop pushing the cable and I ran out of cable to push on.
- I have glued my new rope onto the old cable and can push the cable from front to back of boat but it just doesn't come out through the guide tube at back of boat so I am thinking it is misaligned?

Without having any sort of access hole or being able to see inside the ski I need help!

Some questions for the more experienced members here:
 - Do most skis run a guide tube all the way through the hull from to back or are the tubes just short sections going through the hull walls?
- I've seen the method using a vacumn cleaner to "suck" the new rope in through the guide hole. Will this only work if the guide tube runs the length of the hull or might it work in my situation?
- Should I try the vacumn cleaner suck method with something light like fishing line and then attempt to pull my new rope through?
- I've thought about drilling a larger hole around where the cable should come out in the rudder box but I'm not sure whether this could create more problems.

Any other ideas for me to try?!?!?
Any help for a newbie would be much appreciated!


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Last edit: 5 years 3 months ago by [email protected].

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5 years 3 months ago #34835 by Ranga
Replied by Ranga on topic Damn rudder lines! HELP!
You have a problem Mate!

Your tubes have pulled out at the back and are now inside your ski. By looking at the amount of tube coming out the front that is what I suspect. You should have tube sticking out at the back as well. You should be able to push the SS cable through from either end and it should come out the opposite end.

I replace the tubes all the time, for various reasons, but mostly because they have come adrift. I generally never cut the ski open as I have devised a system to replace them without cutting holes. 

I also never replace SS with Dyneema either as the ski was not designed to have cord and could have sharp edges which would cut the cord. Yes, Dyneema is better generally but not always.

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